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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28791357">Strawberry Blonde</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkeletonsAndAliens/pseuds/SkeletonsAndAliens'>SkeletonsAndAliens</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The X-Files</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cuddling &amp; Snuggling, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Motel, On the Run, Post-Episode: s09e19-20 The Truth, Post-Season/Series 09, Scully's true hair colour</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 08:27:08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,762</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28791357</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkeletonsAndAliens/pseuds/SkeletonsAndAliens</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>While on the run, Mulder discovers Scully's true hair color.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Fox Mulder/Dana Scully</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Strawberry Blonde</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was in Nevada that he first noticed something different about her. They were lying in a seedy motel, his arm thrown over her waist, her head on his naked chest. He had forgotten to close the curtains the night before and the early morning sun spilled over their skin like a halo. </p><p>Mulder looked down on her and pressed his nose softly to the top of her head, breathing in the familiar Scully-scent. He almost missed it at first; even this early the sunlight was warm and bright, making her hair blaze as it caught the glow. However, the slightest hint of gold amidst the fire caught his gaze and he frowned, pulling his head backward to have a better look.</p><p>Scully moved softly against his chest when she felt him move, tightening her arms around him as if to keep him chained to her. Not that he would ever leave her here. They had nobody but each other; he was well aware that she could have left him if she wanted to, and yet she was still here. Mulder was not about to break that trust. </p><p>It had been a while since they had last been able to truly be themselves. They had fled, like criminals - and he supposed he was fleeing from his death sentence, but she had done nothing except love him. It was his fault they had to resort to fake names, posing as a married couple in deadbeat towns, only staying a few days at most, until the people started whispering behind their backs about the lack of wedding rings or their single lonely suitcase holding everything they possessed. </p><p>But this was different. He moved the arm that wasn't securely holding her to him and traced the line of blonde at the top of her scalp as if to make sure that it was real and not just a trick of the light. Breathing in deeply, he closed his eyes. He couldn't believe it. A part of him felt almost betrayed - as if this discovery that her hair color was not real, meant that everything else hadn't been real as well. As if she was suddenly someone else, and not his Scully with her fiery mane that made her look so much bigger than her short stature should allow. </p><p>Scully woke to his soft ministrations and looked up at him, a sleepy smile on her face. She was unaware of the discovery he had made and the doubts that suddenly flooded his uncertain mind. "Good morning, Mulder.", she said softly into his skin, nuzzling the rough fuzz on his chest. They didn't get to call each other by their real names much anymore. It was too risky when they were outside; every man in a suit, every woman wearing sunglasses could be an agent from some government agency ready to take them back, to give him his 'well-deserved' lethal injection and lock her up for treason and aiding a known murderer. Oh, how far they have strayed. The line between good and bad, crime and law, truth and lie had once been so strong, set in stone; but now it was blurry and neither one of them could pinpoint exactly when they crossed it or on what side they were now anyways.</p><p>"You're blonde..", he said instead of a good morning, having stayed silent about his thoughts when they came to Scully for far too long. He couldn't keep them in any more, had promised himself he would always speak his mind, to never lie by omission to her ever again. </p><p>A soft chuckle escaped her chest and instinctively one of her own hands that had been wrapped around his back came up to touch her head. "I was due to dye it soon.. Maybe I should let it grow out now. Be less recognizable.", she answered as if it was no big deal. But to Mulder, it was. It felt like she was giving up her identity, the one she had chosen herself, not the one she was born with. There must have been a reason she had dyed her hair red for almost ten years - although, when he thought back to the first time he met her, he seemed to remember her hair being a light brown instead of the blazing red he was so accustomed to. </p><p>"No, I..", Mulder started, unsure of how to bring into words what he was feeling, what he was thinking. How he not only liked the color of her hair but how it felt so much like her that he couldn't imagine Scully without her fiery mane. How he felt guilty for taking one more thing away from her, one more choice that she couldn't make anymore because of the situation he had brought her into. How he almost felt betrayed by the fact that he had to learn like this, when they knew each other for so long, had been through so much together. He had never even considered that red might not be her natural hair color; although maybe now he understood why she was always shaved. Maybe she hadn't wanted him to know. Maybe it felt too much like lying to him, even though it was just such a non-problem, something so trivial, that he shouldn't be reading this much into it. But Mulder had always been an overthinker, even when it seemed like he just did everything by impulse. He couldn't help himself.</p><p>"I don't want you to feel like you have to give this up for me, as well...", he whispered after a silent moment where he had tried to gather his thoughts, having settled for this one aspect, his ever-evident guilt shining through in his voice and his gaze. Scully had stayed silent, knowing him well enough to know when he just needed to think, to get a grip on the flurry of thoughts that raced through his mind.  </p><p>She moved her hand to his hair now, stroking him softly through his silky locks, a serene smile on her face. She was his rock; he tightened his arm around her as if he wanted to anchor himself to her steady form. "Maybe we should make you blond as well. I think it would look good on you.", she whispered, her voice mellow this early in the morning. Mulder felt himself melt against her caress and nodded softly.</p><p>Her wish was his command.</p>
<hr/><p>A few weeks later, she sat on their bed in a motel in a place with a name she didn't even bother to remember in the very plausible state of Oregon and waited until he came out of the bathroom. She had showered earlier and busied herself with brushing through her golden locks, the red coloring having faded completely by now. She felt younger, somehow, with her natural hair color. It had been so long since she had allowed herself to see it, without covering it up. Scully had started dyeing her hair red after she met him but had started hiding her blonde locks long before that. In the Academy she had chosen brown, to blend in, so that the other students would stop making stupid blonde jokes whenever she was around and so that they might finally see her as their equal and not just a pretty girl.</p><p>But when she met him, she suddenly didn't want to blend in anymore. She wanted to stand out, to be noticed. They spent so much of their time in the basement, where it was dark and quiet and musty, and whenever they came up all anyone would talk about was their crazy search for aliens and ghosts and other spooky things. But when she started dyeing her hair red, suddenly people started noticing her again, and not just as 'Mrs. Spooky'. And eventually, the red of her hair had become such a part of her personality that she didn't even consider picking another color. Maybe a part of her didn't want to disappoint him, to have him suddenly see her in a different light when he knew that she wasn't naturally this red-headed vixen he knew her as.</p><p>The door of the bathroom opened and Mulder stepped out, a towel low on his waist and another around his head, hiding his newly dyed look from her curious gaze. Scully stood up and dropped the brush on the bed. Her hands softly touched his bare sides above the towel and she smiled at him. He was looking at her with that unbelieving gaze again, the one he had had when they woke up together for the first time and again when he discovered this secret about her.</p><p>"How does it feel to be blond?", she asked softly, smiling up at him encouragingly. Mulder reached up and unwound the towel from his hair, showing her for the first time his new look. And oh, how different he looked. Her hands trailed up until she could wind them in the sandy blond softness, relieved that it still felt the same even when even his smell was different. </p><p>They truly felt like different people now. Almost everything about them had changed; for the first time, the weight of their situation seemed to hit both of them at once. Mulder and Scully were no more. Mulder and Scully were criminals, wanted by the government because of their search for the truth. But the couple that was looking at each other now had found their truth. They gazed into familiar eyes; the only thing they couldn't and wouldn't change, the one thing other than the scars that reminded them of the past, of the conspiracies that had led them here, of the love that kept them alive even when they had both died so many times before. </p><p>Mulder didn't answer her question. He cradled her head softly in his strong hands, barely touching her freckled skin as if he was afraid that she might somehow disappear or shatter if he used too much pressure. And then he bent down, touching her lips to his, and when they closed their eyes they could almost pretend that they could turn back time. He still tasted the same as he did the first time, when she was redheaded and he was brown-haired. </p><p>Now so much more than the color of their hair had changed. And yet, if they would have been able to go back, neither of them would do anything differently. Their journey had shaped them in a much deeper way than a packet of dye ever would.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Inspired by Shadow Man's admission in S09E06 'Trust No1' that he knows everything about Scully, including 'her true hair color' and 'that one lonely night you invited Mulder into your bed'.<br/>Feel free to leave a comment, I love reading them &lt;3</p></blockquote></div></div>
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